


In Loving Memory

by Rinascimento



Category: Assassin's Creed - All Media Types
Genre: Body Horror, Gen, Grief/Mourning, Wakes & Funerals, identifying body
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-07-28
Updated: 2020-07-28
Packaged: 2021-03-06 01:34:49
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,499
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25565230
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Rinascimento/pseuds/Rinascimento
Summary: During that horrible funeral, Harold and his estranged wife mourn and remember the day they learned news of their missing son's whereabouts. They had prepared for the worst.
Comments: 2
Kudos: 6





	In Loving Memory

**Author's Note:**

> Written for this prompt: Visiting the grave of a beloved friend/family member/pet. Having a private funeral and remembering the good times in the past.
> 
> It devolved into more than that. I named Clay's mother Linda because Harold would have said her name out loud. Remember I don't own any of these characters!

* * *

The noise was unbearable.  
  


He could hardly think, could hardly breathe. His peripheral was compromised, hazy around the edges. Tears, he realized distantly, that threatened to form. The soft murmur of the guests were like a buzzing in his ear, an unbearable white noise that would not cease no matter how hard he tried to tune them out. 

Everything about this was wrong. Even to get to this point--it was wrong. The red tape just to retrieve their son. The mountains of paperwork and verifications. Going through the translators and the embassy and the funeral director and the airport staff and the _bullshit_ . Just to bring him home. Just to let him _rest_.

_And they couldn’t even bother to get his birthday on his fucking tombstone?_

  
What was worse? Was it when they approached him with the gentlest condolences and “I’m so sorry’s”? 

_What did_ **_you_ ** _have to be sorry for? You can shove your condolences up your fuckin’ ass_. 

The gentle touches to his arm? 

_Don't **fucking** touch me_ _!_

Was it the pastor that churned on and on and on, like a banging pain over his ribcage with each word he spat from the podium? Or was it that each word he spoke seemed to accuse him?

_The Lord is my shepherd, I lack nothing. He makes me lie down in green pastures…_

He wanted to rage and yell and scream until his lungs collapsed within himself. The pain and grief he felt was like a white hot searing metallic liquid, one that threatened to spill and ooze out of every crevice and pore but, at the slightest resistance, kept him painfully in place. 

_He leads me beside quiet waters, he refreshes my soul._

A cruel irony. Those quiet waters had seeped into the cuts that the autopsy concluded were self-inflicted-- _Self-inflicted_ ? **_No_ **.--Those quiet waters changed him. Morphed him. And if the Lord couldn’t protect his body, what hope could he have for his soul?

_He guides me along the right paths for his name’s sake._

The headlines had been worse. _Body of American Man Found in Tiber River_. As if he had no name. As if he was no one. He was alive. He was somebody. But it was as if he never existed, the point punctuated by the glaring, cruel error on his tombstone that solely displayed the date of his death. 

_Even though I walk through the darkest valley, I will fear no evil…_

But the worst of it had to be the subheading. The knife that had originally undid him. That puzzled and tormented him in his sleep as it did in his conscience. 

_Suicide Suspected_. It made no sense. It was like a nightmare he could never hope to wake from. And his son’s voice echoed in his mind whenever he so much as blinked. 

**_I’m happier, dad_ ** **.**

It made no sense. 

**_I’ve found my place and purpose..._ **

What was he even doing in Italy? Why would he do this? Why hadn’t he checked his email sooner? Why hadn’t he known? Why hadn’t he picked up his phone? 

**_...I will always love you._ **

Why didn’t he call back? 

**_...wasn’t your fault._ **

Why? Why why why why why...

_...for you are with me; Your rod and your staff, they comfort me._

Slender fingers touched his own and he realized that he was gripping his knee tightly. His eyes were fixated on the pastor who spoke but they saw nothing. He could drown out the booming voice for the moment and he inhaled shakily through his nose as he turned to look to the woman who had just sat beside him. 

The one who knew, aside from him, what they were really burying in that box. A **thing**. A thing that was once their son. 

_Surely your goodness and love will follow me all the days of my life…_

His face contorted then, crumbling as a sob choked out of him. A bubbling sound. One that erupted from his core, that he had been carefully containing within himself for years. 

_...and I will dwell in the house of the Lord forever._

For the first time, it was tumbling from him. The weight of his failures crashing down on him, not in the waves that were sure to come, but in one fell swoop that he knew would never relent.

* * *

_“Something’s happened.”_

_His voice was hard though with a tremble, a strain to keep it together and he found himself having to take deep breaths to continue._

_“They found him, Linda. In Rome, Italy. Don’t ask me how but I’m--I’m booking a flight.” He had clung to the phone with both hands then, his mouth opening, a thousand words unspoken on his tongue. But all he could wrangle out was one last plea._

_“Please call me.”_

* * *

  
  


All around them, the world continued spinning. The Rome airport was booming with people waiting in lines, people passing them by, hugging loved ones, laughing, talking, yelling. 

But Harold and Linda walked quietly, solemnly, briskly. Harold felt as if he were on a conveyor belt, the world whisking by him and he had no time to observe. Hell, he barely had time to look at Linda. He hadn’t heard from her in the better part of 2 years now. So many things left between them unsaid. So many mistakes. But there was no time for that now. They didn’t speak until they found who they were looking for, holding their name on some flimsy cardboard.

Linda spoke to them first, to his annoyance. But that was the way Linda was. Always insisting, always wanting to take the reigns in these matters to show that she could do it. But maybe this time, it was for the best. Harold could hardly speak, stammering his way through everything, tremble at his hand as he did his best to keep a straight face. It was always tougher for him when it came to things like this. Business. Work. Matters that lacked emotional attachment. That’s what he was good at. 

Not this.

She had all of the paperwork. She had spoken evenly with the authorities. She was always good at that stuff. Even now, she seemed so well put together, even though he could tell just beneath the surface, she was just a touch away from shattering. The truth was Linda was the strong one. Always had been. And he never appreciated that. He kept a brave face for her.

A blur as they traveled to the local authorities with their guide and translator. He shivered as he stared out the window, looking out at the sunny blue skies of Rome, Italy. Felt sick to his stomach how the world seemed to go and go and go, as if nothing were wrong and nothing had changed. The cruel and unfeeling world, spinning around them with nothing to show for their pain but clear blue skies and sunshine. His inner world was colliding with this outer one and he thought for a moment he would erupt.   
  
A gentle touch grounded him, a familiar feeling that would have felt foreign to him if he hadn’t dreamt of it every night for the past two years. Harold shut his eyes tightly. His fingers curled around her slender ones as he exhaled. They were being brave for each other. Holding each other together. Preparing themselves for the worst.

But nothing could have prepared either of them for what awaited them in the morgue. Even when they held onto each other for the first time since they divorced years ago. Even when they both kept their chins held high, their faces stoic and strong. Even when he could hear the slight tremor just beneath her tone as she spoke and when he realized the shuttered, strained breathing that he was hearing was his own.

_God, please, don’t let this be our son._

But in the very moment when they pulled back those daunting, white sheets, the strength that they had held on to the entire way to Europe was sucked away. 

“ _Oh my_ **_God_ **\--!”

It was beyond words. A sight that would be burned into their skulls for the rest of their days.

The horror drew a blood curdling scream from Linda. Her wails reverberated sharply against the sterile walls and engulfed them painfully. Harold had reared back, a calloused hand covering his dry mouth. Bile was rising in his throat. His stomach clenched tightly and he stifled a pained noise that he hadn’t known _anyone_ could ever make. 

For just beneath the disgust and indescribable horror was an agony unimaginable. Only a mother, a father could recognize the bloated, discolored thing on that sterile table. Features warped and deformed. Skin torn open. Pale and cold and recognizable.

“That’s him.” The voice glossed with wet tears and shuddering breath seemed so foreign to him that, again, he only faintly realized that it was his own. He tore his gaze away from the repulsive sight. “That’s Clay.”

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading!
> 
> I plan on continuing this but I am just not sure how or when I will be doing so. For now, I will say it's complete as a one shot. Be on the look out for part 2 and 3! My plan is to have a part 2 by 8/8/2020 (RIP Clay). Also if I missed any tags please let me know! 
> 
> -K


End file.
